runaway fund and new notes

[gurneyhalleck]

I am wondering how to convert my runaway fund from old twenties to new twenties discreetly in this time of Corona.

I have been skimming my daily spends for years, saving 20-30 pounds a week from my daily lunch/coffee work money. This I have been keeping as physical cash tucked away and it's a sizable sum.

After years, I feel restless in my marriage. I am considering cutting the cord once the children hit adulthood in a couple of years. Much of my stash is in old twenties. How can I get these converted in one go without having to leave details, or cldo I have to do it piecemeal? My problem there is I am currently not in the office, so normally where I could have stopped by on my way in to do it, I don't have that regularity at the moment. Any ideas? Obviously I would like to keep it out of any accounts or anything that leaves an electronic trail

Nobody uses travellers cheques any more. Its all done by card now

Any bank or post office will just swap them over. I got petty cash mo ey that was an old tenner and went into the bank (not even my bank) and the teller just swapped it for a new one.

Any bank or post office will just swap them over

I would hope no bank or post office would just change several thousand pounds in cash without doing appropriate money laundering due diligence. Especially since OP has no records to prove where it came from.

We're not talking the odd tenner here.

Op if you both have separate accounts and you're not in an abusive or financially controlling relationship then why have you been hiding cash?
It's very risky in the case of burglary/ house fire etc.

The notes are still legal tender. No withdrawal date has been given and when it does, it will be with 6 months notice, so I wouldn't worry yet.

But I think taking the money from the joint account isn't right.

I do not take funds from the joint account. The only money I save is from my separate account, by going without with regards lunch's and coffees and such that both my partner and I indulge in, by mutual agreement.

So if all money is family money, I should collapse my separate account and every single penny should be in the joint account? Also if the money is mine, surely it is mine to decide how to handle it? Or is it just mine if I spend it on a Costa every day?

@gurneyhalleck to answer your question, with the parameters/caveats you have set, I would count the number of notes, and set a reasonable goal of how many to exchange via normal usage each week.

EG you withdraw £80 for grocery shopping in new notes, and immediately exchange those new notes with your old stashed notes and spend the old ones (minus the new stashed amount).

Yes, depending on the number of notes you have, it may take awhile.

You could also go to the bank and try and change some notes to a bigger denomination of new notes EG take 5 x £20 pound notes and get 1 x £100.

I had to do a similar thing with our work’s chocolate fund - turn all the coins and low denomination notes into big ones to pay for our Christmas party. I did most at the bank (no need to go through an account, but they did make a note of it), or doing it myself with my own notes when I needed some coins for something.

It was quite satisfying to chip away at getting them changed over, and you’ll probably appreciate having the bigger denominations - easier to count and store (not so bulky).

Op do u mean
A. you get day £100 each spending money so you draw £20, spend £10 and save £10 every few weeks or
B. you have day £800 in the shared account so you withdraw £100 for food, spend 80 and save 20 every month?

Ethics aside, say lift £100 from cash machine, keep that and spend £100 from old stash notes and Go to your bank and ask to exchange them? but smaller amounts at a time

Why not just leave your partner instead of stringing him along any longer?

If my wife decided to leave me I'd be hearbroken but marriages breakdown and people fall out of love for all sorts of reasons so I'd get over it eventually.

However if I then found out she'd been squirrelling away cash and planning it for years I'd be furious. Not really over the money but over the the fact she'd wasted X amount of years of my life in a relationship she had no plans on continuing. Denying me the chance to make decisions for my future, or at the very least save for it too.

Banks and post office will change them without question if the amounts are reasonable.
Take £200 and ask for 4 £50 notes. Take £100 and ask for 10 £10’s.

Shops won’t change money anymore due to the chance of forgery.

Pay cash to buy a gift card for a shop you know you will use. Be careful as some gift cards expire after a year.

Still plenty time to use paper £20 notes there has been no date for withdrawing them yet

Except that shops are not wanting to take cash at the moment and who knows how long that will continue.

DH who always preferred using cash to card made an ATM withdrawal just before lockdown started and its still untouched because the places we have been shopping only want card payments

I don't understand why you aren't just putting this money into your own account? I had money when I split from my husband, but it wasn't my 'runaway fund' it was my 'savings' - all of which I declared when it came to financial disclosure.

Why don't you want to do that?

I get it.

Let’s say a couple agree to have £100 per months each as spends.
One person uses this money on magazines, coffee, treats. The other person buys nothing and saves the money. After 5 years they have saved £6000. If the couple divorce and that money is in a bank account it will be included in the financial disclosure. The ex partner could get half meaning they have received £9000 and the saver only gets £3000.

Speak to Women's Aid or National Domestic Abuse Helpline - or maybe your own bank in private to see if it's possible to open an online account without a paper trail visible at your home that you can put this money in until you need it. I'm assuming a fund to enable you to leave, rent a home, buy necessities etc if/when you left?

Your stash of cash is not necessarily secure. What if you were forced to leave without being able to access it? Or your partner/husband etc found it and took it? Or as a PP mentioned, in case of fire or burglary? Also do you have your own, separate credit card?

Prepaid credit or debit cards? The type you can use for spending on holidays. Some online only bank accounts like Monzo or Monese are an app and can be opened in minutes with no post required except if you need to apply for a credit card to be delivered to you. Your account can be linked to google pay or apple pay so you don't need to have a physical card at all.

The only shop I’ve found that will accept cash (we had a stash of old £20s) are the self checkouts in supermarkets.

If the money is in your own personal account in the first place, then why can't you just leave it in there?

Why have you wasted years of your life on a dead marriage?

Wow what a compassionate little sentence that is . Nice

Op I think you should visit your bank and ask for a paperless bank account that’s with the same branch as current account
My bank have these
And if not already done set up online banking
The very idea if you stashing all these notes worries me and is pretty risky TBH

Stay well

I wonder if a prepaid cash card might be your solution, check with your bank. Money Saving Expert has articles on this. Where do you keep your physical cash so your dh can't find it? I'd get a safety deposit box at least to keep it?

Once OP leaves the marriage she will be using the savings to set up her home and buy a car so would it be counted as marital assets if it's spent on her essential living costs? I'm widowed now but always had my own money when I was married.

Where abouts do you stash the thousands? Genuinely curious as don’t think I’d have a stash place, and would be constantly worried about being found or stolen, esp with teenage kids snooping. I agree that if it’s your own cash, you can do what you like. I would regard it a rainy day fund- if one of your family needed something urgent etc, not just running away, which might have been primary goal.

All this hassle, wouldnt it be easier and more sensible for you to leave. And you waiting for the kids to be adults - they most definitely know they are living in an unhappy home. You are wasting precious years of your life.

If somebody is feeling the need to stash cash in notes in order to leave a relationship on the future then I would think that this person has enough shit to contend with without people piling on and telling them how immoral their behaviour is.
I reckon the behaviour of the partner is probably worse, hence the need to save and hide the money.
In how many bad relationships would the partner spend the money if he knew it existed in order to keep the ‘saving partner’ trapped in the relationship?
Cash is not a good way to keep money because of the burglary etc risks. Monzo would be a good idea for OP.
For those worrying about form E and divorce asset splitting....I reckon the money will be gone on rental deposits and furniture by the time divorce paperwork is in place.

I agree. The lack of empathy on this thread is astonishing.

There will be a reason why she is doing this, most likely that her husband is controlling about money.

If you don't understand why a woman might need to do this, be quiet and count your blessings rather than accusing her of fraud or whatever. She is gathering cash to enable her to leave the home and meet her immediate needs when she sets up elsewhere, not trying to defraud him of the value of the house.

You dont make sense OP. If you are not skimming the pot then why do you need to hide the money? If he's not abusive, it's just be a savings account. And if it is just a couple of thousand for a deposit then it'll be long spent before the accounting for a divorce could touch it.